August 21
HAPPY HAWAII STATEHOOD DAY!!! It's been 61 years since 1959, when, in that August, President Eisenhower signed into law the Congressional Act that made Hawaii the 50th (and so far -- is D.C. next? -- latest) State in the Union.
It's a State (but not Federal) holiday here in Hawaii today -- So, I had the luxury of sleeping in (working-from-offsite today) -- which means that, for the eight of you who usually get the New York Times Morning Briefing from me "in the wee small hours of the morning" -- you're receiving it at a more "normal" hour!
It's been fascinating to me to watch first-hand the evolution -- here in Hawaii -- of community attitudes toward Statehood, in view of the following complicated history as to how the Hawaiian Islands became part of the United States:
A "Sparks Notes" summary (I apologize for the length): In January 1893, a cabal of 20 haole (white) businessmen -- believing that Queen Lili'uokalani was trying to assert too much power in the constitutional monarchy (the Kingdom having been founded in 1810 and then having become a constitutional monarchy in 1841) -- and drawing upon their U.S. colonial heritage -- declared that they were "A Committee of Public Safety." They asked the U.S. Ambassador to the Nation of Hawaii to support their "revolution" to oust Lili'uokalani and to declare Hawaii to be a Republic. The U.S. Ambassador obliged, providing 120 sailors and troops from the USS Boston, anchored in Honolulu Harbor, to support the Committee of Public Safety with rifles and cannon. They surrounded the Iolani Palace home of the Queen, and gave her an ultimatum to resign -- "or there will be bloodshed."
Then, Lili'uokalani -- remembering that, at age 5, in 1843, she had witnessed a ceremony in which the independence of the Hawaiian Nation had been restored by Great Britain after Queen Victoria decided that a takeover six months before by the then-British Ambassador (whom she, of course, sacked) was illegal) -- wrote a letter of resignation to the U.S. Ambassador Plenipotentiary to Hawaii (not to the Committee of Safety) stating, "I resign only until such time that the United States restores me to my rightful throne."
That was on January 17, 1893 -- Back then, U.S. Presidential inaugurations were held on March 20th, not January 20th. In the U.S. Presidential election of 1892, Democrat Grover Cleveland after one term out of office, had mounted a comeback -- and won. Republican Benjamin Harrison was on his way out of office. At the same time, the Republicans had re-asserted their control of both houses of Congress. Shortly after Grover Cleveland became President -- again -- on March 20th, he sent a Special Emissary to the Hawaiian Islands to investigate the circumstances of the coup against Queen Lili'uokalani. The Blount Report stated that the coup had been illegally staged with the support of the United States and that the request to the Congress of the Committee of Public Safety now running Hawaii as "The Republic of Hawaii" to be annexed by the U.S.A. should be denied.
So, the Republic of Hawaii sat out here, independent, in the mid-Pacific until the Spanish- American War of 1898. As I often say half-jokingly, "The U.S. likes its wars short and sweet" -- The U.S. defeated Spain that summer and acquired the Spanish overseas Empire -- Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Northern Marianas -- and the Philippines. The U.S. then needed a coaling station for the ships plying back-and-forth between the U.S. West Coast and the Philippines -- and Pearl Harbor and Honolulu Harbor were perfect: Both houses of Congress, controlled by the Republicans, voted to annex the Republic of Hawaii as a U.S. possession -- but each house could only muster a bare majority in favor, whereas, in prior acquisitions of territory, the vote requirement had been 2/3rds of each house of Congress. So, the Republican majorities in each house of Congress changed the rules, reducing the requirement to a simple majority. (How anachronistic! Reminds one of current-day Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's moves!) And both houses of Congress then voted by the requisite simple majority to annex the Hawaiian Islands as part of the U.S.A.
At the time of the coup-overthrow of the Queen, there were only 40,000 pure blooded Hawaiians left, from the estimated 400,000 when Captain Cook "discovered" Hawaii in 1778 (because of, primarily, lack of immunity to Western diseases). Most of the adults (30,000) among these Native Hawaiians signed a petition -- called the Ku'e Papers -- imploring the United States to do the "pono" (right) thing and NOT to annex Hawaii. To no avail. Hawaii was annexed in 1898 and then declared by Congress to be a capital "T" Territory preparing to become a State.
However, given Hawaii's predominantly non-white population (due to not only the Native Hawaiians but also the even larger number of contract laborers imported from China, Japan, and the Philippines to work in the sugar and pineapple fields -- including my Dad), the Southern white Senators always opposed Statehood for Hawaii, from 1900 onward.
Fast Forward to December 7, 1941 -- Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in the Territory of Hawaii, as we all know from history, was the Day Of Infamy that drew the U.S. into World War II. At the time of the attack (which was on all U.S. bases on Oahu, not only Pearl), the population of the Territory was 400,000 -- with 50,000 of them being immigrants who were still Japanese nationals and 100,000 of them being Americans of Japanese ancestry (AJAs) born on U.S. soil in the Territory of Hawaii. They were not rounded up and interned in prison camps, like the 120,000 individuals of Japanese ancestry in the U.S. West, because (1) the businessmen running the sugar and pineapple plantations got word to President Roosevelt and his advisers that the Hawaii economy would be devastated by internment; (2) internment of the Hawaii-based Japanese would have been a logistical nightmare (if not to the West Coast, even to the neighboring island of Molokai or the Big Island of Hawaii); and (3), ironically, some of the best divers who could repair the ships damaged at Pearl Harbor were of Japanese ancestry.
AJAs like my Uncle Seichi Ono who were ROTC students at the University of Hawaii on December 7, 1941, were activated immediately and deployed around Oahu to guard Oahu against enemy invasion. They were left at their posts for two weeks with no contact and no food -- and then, at the end of the two weeks, U.S. Army soldiers came to them, grabbed the M-1 rifles they had been issued, and told: "You're all a bunch of Japs -- we don't want you -- go home." The young AJAs never forgot that sting of discrimination. In the meantime, they formed a group to support the U.S. war effort called the "Varsity Victory Volunteers" (VVV), engaging in community fund and blood drives and proving their loyalty to the U.S. Finally, in mid-1943, President Roosevelt authorized the formation of segregated units of young AJA men, aged 18 to 26, under the command of white officers, to be trained and then sent to fight where they would not be mistaken for the Japanese enemy -- Europe. The 100th Battalion and the 442nd Infantry Division fought in Italy and France and even assisted in the liberation of Auschwitz. But the 40,000 AJA volunteers paid a heavy price -- many of them were maimed, and they left 1,000 of their friends buried in the U;S. military cemeteries in Europe.
After World War II, the 100th Battalion and 442nd Infantry AJAs used their G.I. Bill benefits to earn their bachelor's and professional degrees -- My Uncle, Seichi, was the first in our Family to "Go East, Young Man" for college: He earned his bachelor's degree at Springfield College in Massachusetts -- where James Naismith created the game of basketball (and where the U.S. Basketball Hall of Fame is located). Seichi then returned to the Hawaiian Islands, settled on Kauai, and won the Kauai Island Interscholastic Football Championship for 10 years in a row (he was being called "Champ" as a compliment and eventually adopted that as his legal first name) before turning to becoming a public school vice principal and principal.
The cabal of businessmen who overthrew Queen Lili'uokalani and then got the U.S. Congress to annex Hawaii in 1893 were Republicans -- they ran the "Big Five" corporations that dominated the Hawaii economy from the 1880s to the 1950s. But a "peaceful political revolution" was brewing: During World War II, a dour and devout Honolulu Police Department captain of Irish descent, John (Jack) Burns, was assigned to keep tabs on the Japanese community. After World War II, Burns began to organize the AJAs who were coming home to Hawaii with their college and professional degrees (they called themselves "sparrows") politically. They took control of the opposition Democratic Party -- and, in 1954, for the first time ever, the Democrats won control of both houses of the then-Territorial Legislature. Next, in 1956, Jack Burns was elected as the Delegate to Congress (a non-voting position in the U.S. House for capital-T Territories preparing to become a State). Jack Burns arrived in D.C. and immediately came under the tutelage of Democratic Senate Majority Leader from Texas, Senator Lyndon Johnson, and Democratic House Speaker, Sam Rayburn, also of Texas.
For decades since Hawaii had been declared a Territory in 1900, Hawaii's Delegates to Congress (Republicans until Burns in 1956) had tried to get Congress to grant Hawaii Statehood as the 49th State to be followed by Alaska -- with 1/5 the population of Hawaii -- as the 50th. And, each session, the Hawaii 49th State bill died. In 1956, when Burns arrived on Capitol Hill, Lyndon Johnson was already making plans to run for U.S. President in 1960. John didn't want to be viewed on the national scene as being racist, and so he latched on to the idea that, if he supported Statehood for Hawaii, which would be the very first Territory with a non-white population to become a State, he could reduce that stereotype.
And Johnson, Rayburn, and Burns came up with a new strategy: Let Alaska become a new State first as the 49th State -- and then Hawaii would then have an easier time (pardon the obvious analogy;) surfing in as the 50th State in the wake of the Alaska momentum. This strategy would help overcome two of the three main reasons often cited as to why Alaska and Hawaii should not be States: (1) They are non-contiguous to the other 48 States. Granted, Alaska is non-contiguous by only the 200 miles of British Columbia that separate it from Washington State, but the fact remains Alaska IS, indeed, non-contiguous. (2) The International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union (ILWU) was viewed as being Communist-leaning during the Joseph McCarthy "Red Scare" days of the late 1940s -- but Alaska had a higher proportion of its population that was ILWU members than did Hawaii. And (3) Hawaii would be the first Territory with a non-white population to be admitted into the Union (Alaska had a white majority population far larger than the Native Tribes population of Eskimos, Aleuts, and Intuits). This last argument (3) Delegate Burns turned on its head: He said: "What a great example Hawaii is that the U.S. can show to the rest of the world that non-whites and whites can live in relative harmony and that democracy can work in such a mixed society."
So, Burns let the Alaska Statehood Bill go first, for a change, and, in the summer of 1958, the Alaska Statehood Bill passed both houses of Congress -- and Alaska became the 49th State. And then the Congress adjourned! Delegate Burns had to come home to Hawaii and spent most of the time in his 1958 re-election campaign trying to convince a majority of the voters that "Now that Alaska has gotten Statehood, we in Hawaii will be next, in the next session of Congress." Luckily for Burns, he turned out to be correct, but there sure was a lot of nail-biting before his 1958 re-election. He returned to Congress in January 1959 and, with the support of his mentors, Senate Majority Leader Johnson and Speaker Rayburn, shepherded the "Hawaii 50th State" Bill through in March, 1959, followed by a formal signing ceremony at the White House in August. HENCE: STATEHOOD DAY IS A STATE HOLIDAY ON THE THIRD FRIDAY OF EACH AUGUST.
BUT THE STORY'S NOT DONE -- AND SOME WOULD SAY, FAR FROM DONE -- You will note, in Paragraph 11, above, that the Hawaii Statehood movement gained momentum here only after the AJA (Americans of Japanese ancestry) veterans who survived fighting in Europe in World War II came home after the War -- and advocated Statehood as being the best tribute that they could provide to their friends who had lost their lives fighting in Europe for the U.S. and proving their loyalty to the U.S.
Over the past 61 years of Statehood, however -- as I've noted in Paragraph 3 above -- community attitudes toward Statehood have changed: In 1958, after the Hawaii Statehood Bill passed Congress, as required by the Bill, a "plebiscite" -- a direct vote of the electorate -- was held to approve Statehood: The vote was 85 percent for, 15 percent against. Interestingly, the only precinct that voted against Statehood was the 200 voters, mostly of Native Hawaiian ancestry, on the Island of Niihau. Attitudes toward the benefits of Statehood began to shift in the 1970s with the so-called Hawaiian Renaissance, when a younger generation of part-Native-Hawaiians (there are only 9,000 pure bloods, but 300,000 others in Hawaii's total population today of 1.2 residents -- 1/4 -- claim at least some Native Hawaiian ancestry, including my wife and our two now-grown children). In the 1970s, the Ku'e Petitions objecting to Hawaii annexation to the U.S. in 1898 -- which Petitions had been forgotten by most of the populace for a generation -- came back into the community consciousness.
In addition, since the 1970s, there has been a realization that there has not been a full accounting -- and not been full payment -- by the federal (U.S.) government for its use of lands originally belonging to the Nation of Hawaii for primarily military bases. When Hawaii was annexed in 1898, the Republic of Hawaii "ceded" (gave over) to the U.S. government all of the lands that had belonged to the Kingdom of Hawaii government under Lili'uokalani. So, bases such as Pearl Harbor and all the other military bases in Hawaii were used by the federal government without any compensation (contra to the last clause of the Fifth Amendment: "nor shall private property be taken for public use without compensation") to the Territorial government. Then, under the Statehood Act of 1959, the federal government "ceded" back to the new State of Hawaii government the lands that the federal government had gotten from the Republic of Hawaii.
In the Statehood Act of 1959, it is stated (no pun intended) that the "ceded lands" being returned to the State of Hawaii government by the federal government shall be used for five purposes (e.g., public education schools) -- the fifth purpose of which is "for the betterment of the lives of Native Hawaiians. Thus, the State courts have ruled that 20 percent of the income from "ceded lands" now held by the State (i.e., 1 of the 5 purposes equals 20 percent) must go to "the betterment of the lives of Native Hawaiians." However, after 61 years of Statehood, the State government and the various community groups representing the interests of Native Hawaiians are still negotiating a "universal settlement." So, you can see why celebrations for Statehood on this holiday are muted not only due to the coronavirus but also because of the unresolved issues of "just compensation."
It's also interesting to note that, when the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress in 1993 - the 100th anniversary of the overthrow of Queen Lili'uoklani -- by a majority in both houses, the Congress passed what's called "the Apology Resolution" -- In a Joint Resolution of Congress passed in 1993, it is admitted that overthrow of the Queen was illegal, and that the U.S. government apologizes for that. But, at the same time, the Resolution, of course, does not say that, the coup having been illegal, Hawaii can have its independence back.
Meanwhile, there is a small but vocal group of Native Hawaiians and their supporters who assert that the Nation of Hawaii was NOT extinguished with the overthrow of Queen Lili'uokalani because, to begin with, in their view, the overthrow was illegal under international law. Further, they assert that the annexation process by the U.S. Congress in 1898 is fatally flawed because the Congress changed the rules for approval of annexation. This small but vocal group asserts that the Nation of Hawaii, from the days of the Queen, has never been extinguished and that Hawaii is an unwilling "colony" of the U.S.A. This group has even filed a petition with the United Nations Committee on Decolonization, asking for a hearing
Is Hawaii and are the people of Hawaii "better off" for being a State of the U.S.A. rather than an independent Nation? For example, the average citizen has more individual rights under the U.S. Bill of Rights to the U.S. Constitution than that average citizen would have had under the Constitution of the independent Nation of Hawaii back in 1893.
Perhaps what I call a "purposeful ambiguity" may be best? Most of us in Hawaii are comfortable of being BOTH U.S. citizens AND supportive of Native Hawaiian rights. I have a U.S. Army Reserve officer friend who is both an Army officer and a Native Hawaiian, and he does not see the two as being in conflict. Interestingly, at the same time, in the community at large, the State government has not scheduled, for the past 25 years now, any special commemoration ceremony or concert to mark Statehood Day. Now, that's, in my humble opinion, "purposeful ambiguity"!!!
HAPPY HAWAII STATEHOOD DAY!!! It's been 61 years since 1959, when, in that August, President Eisenhower signed into law the Congressional Act that made Hawaii the 50th (and so far -- is D.C. next? -- latest) State in the Union.
It's a State (but not Federal) holiday here in Hawaii today -- So, I had the luxury of sleeping in (working-from-offsite today) -- which means that, for the eight of you who usually get the New York Times Morning Briefing from me "in the wee small hours of the morning" -- you're receiving it at a more "normal" hour!
It's been fascinating to me to watch first-hand the evolution -- here in Hawaii -- of community attitudes toward Statehood, in view of the following complicated history as to how the Hawaiian Islands became part of the United States:
A "Sparks Notes" summary (I apologize for the length): In January 1893, a cabal of 20 haole (white) businessmen -- believing that Queen Lili'uokalani was trying to assert too much power in the constitutional monarchy (the Kingdom having been founded in 1810 and then having become a constitutional monarchy in 1841) -- and drawing upon their U.S. colonial heritage -- declared that they were "A Committee of Public Safety." They asked the U.S. Ambassador to the Nation of Hawaii to support their "revolution" to oust Lili'uokalani and to declare Hawaii to be a Republic. The U.S. Ambassador obliged, providing 120 sailors and troops from the USS Boston, anchored in Honolulu Harbor, to support the Committee of Public Safety with rifles and cannon. They surrounded the Iolani Palace home of the Queen, and gave her an ultimatum to resign -- "or there will be bloodshed."
Then, Lili'uokalani -- remembering that, at age 5, in 1843, she had witnessed a ceremony in which the independence of the Hawaiian Nation had been restored by Great Britain after Queen Victoria decided that a takeover six months before by the then-British Ambassador (whom she, of course, sacked) was illegal) -- wrote a letter of resignation to the U.S. Ambassador Plenipotentiary to Hawaii (not to the Committee of Safety) stating, "I resign only until such time that the United States restores me to my rightful throne."
That was on January 17, 1893 -- Back then, U.S. Presidential inaugurations were held on March 20th, not January 20th. In the U.S. Presidential election of 1892, Democrat Grover Cleveland after one term out of office, had mounted a comeback -- and won. Republican Benjamin Harrison was on his way out of office. At the same time, the Republicans had re-asserted their control of both houses of Congress. Shortly after Grover Cleveland became President -- again -- on March 20th, he sent a Special Emissary to the Hawaiian Islands to investigate the circumstances of the coup against Queen Lili'uokalani. The Blount Report stated that the coup had been illegally staged with the support of the United States and that the request to the Congress of the Committee of Public Safety now running Hawaii as "The Republic of Hawaii" to be annexed by the U.S.A. should be denied.
So, the Republic of Hawaii sat out here, independent, in the mid-Pacific until the Spanish- American War of 1898. As I often say half-jokingly, "The U.S. likes its wars short and sweet" -- The U.S. defeated Spain that summer and acquired the Spanish overseas Empire -- Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Northern Marianas -- and the Philippines. The U.S. then needed a coaling station for the ships plying back-and-forth between the U.S. West Coast and the Philippines -- and Pearl Harbor and Honolulu Harbor were perfect: Both houses of Congress, controlled by the Republicans, voted to annex the Republic of Hawaii as a U.S. possession -- but each house could only muster a bare majority in favor, whereas, in prior acquisitions of territory, the vote requirement had been 2/3rds of each house of Congress. So, the Republican majorities in each house of Congress changed the rules, reducing the requirement to a simple majority. (How anachronistic! Reminds one of current-day Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's moves!) And both houses of Congress then voted by the requisite simple majority to annex the Hawaiian Islands as part of the U.S.A.
At the time of the coup-overthrow of the Queen, there were only 40,000 pure blooded Hawaiians left, from the estimated 400,000 when Captain Cook "discovered" Hawaii in 1778 (because of, primarily, lack of immunity to Western diseases). Most of the adults (30,000) among these Native Hawaiians signed a petition -- called the Ku'e Papers -- imploring the United States to do the "pono" (right) thing and NOT to annex Hawaii. To no avail. Hawaii was annexed in 1898 and then declared by Congress to be a capital "T" Territory preparing to become a State.
However, given Hawaii's predominantly non-white population (due to not only the Native Hawaiians but also the even larger number of contract laborers imported from China, Japan, and the Philippines to work in the sugar and pineapple fields -- including my Dad), the Southern white Senators always opposed Statehood for Hawaii, from 1900 onward.
Fast Forward to December 7, 1941 -- Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in the Territory of Hawaii, as we all know from history, was the Day Of Infamy that drew the U.S. into World War II. At the time of the attack (which was on all U.S. bases on Oahu, not only Pearl), the population of the Territory was 400,000 -- with 50,000 of them being immigrants who were still Japanese nationals and 100,000 of them being Americans of Japanese ancestry (AJAs) born on U.S. soil in the Territory of Hawaii. They were not rounded up and interned in prison camps, like the 120,000 individuals of Japanese ancestry in the U.S. West, because (1) the businessmen running the sugar and pineapple plantations got word to President Roosevelt and his advisers that the Hawaii economy would be devastated by internment; (2) internment of the Hawaii-based Japanese would have been a logistical nightmare (if not to the West Coast, even to the neighboring island of Molokai or the Big Island of Hawaii); and (3), ironically, some of the best divers who could repair the ships damaged at Pearl Harbor were of Japanese ancestry.
AJAs like my Uncle Seichi Ono who were ROTC students at the University of Hawaii on December 7, 1941, were activated immediately and deployed around Oahu to guard Oahu against enemy invasion. They were left at their posts for two weeks with no contact and no food -- and then, at the end of the two weeks, U.S. Army soldiers came to them, grabbed the M-1 rifles they had been issued, and told: "You're all a bunch of Japs -- we don't want you -- go home." The young AJAs never forgot that sting of discrimination. In the meantime, they formed a group to support the U.S. war effort called the "Varsity Victory Volunteers" (VVV), engaging in community fund and blood drives and proving their loyalty to the U.S. Finally, in mid-1943, President Roosevelt authorized the formation of segregated units of young AJA men, aged 18 to 26, under the command of white officers, to be trained and then sent to fight where they would not be mistaken for the Japanese enemy -- Europe. The 100th Battalion and the 442nd Infantry Division fought in Italy and France and even assisted in the liberation of Auschwitz. But the 40,000 AJA volunteers paid a heavy price -- many of them were maimed, and they left 1,000 of their friends buried in the U;S. military cemeteries in Europe.
After World War II, the 100th Battalion and 442nd Infantry AJAs used their G.I. Bill benefits to earn their bachelor's and professional degrees -- My Uncle, Seichi, was the first in our Family to "Go East, Young Man" for college: He earned his bachelor's degree at Springfield College in Massachusetts -- where James Naismith created the game of basketball (and where the U.S. Basketball Hall of Fame is located). Seichi then returned to the Hawaiian Islands, settled on Kauai, and won the Kauai Island Interscholastic Football Championship for 10 years in a row (he was being called "Champ" as a compliment and eventually adopted that as his legal first name) before turning to becoming a public school vice principal and principal.
The cabal of businessmen who overthrew Queen Lili'uokalani and then got the U.S. Congress to annex Hawaii in 1893 were Republicans -- they ran the "Big Five" corporations that dominated the Hawaii economy from the 1880s to the 1950s. But a "peaceful political revolution" was brewing: During World War II, a dour and devout Honolulu Police Department captain of Irish descent, John (Jack) Burns, was assigned to keep tabs on the Japanese community. After World War II, Burns began to organize the AJAs who were coming home to Hawaii with their college and professional degrees (they called themselves "sparrows") politically. They took control of the opposition Democratic Party -- and, in 1954, for the first time ever, the Democrats won control of both houses of the then-Territorial Legislature. Next, in 1956, Jack Burns was elected as the Delegate to Congress (a non-voting position in the U.S. House for capital-T Territories preparing to become a State). Jack Burns arrived in D.C. and immediately came under the tutelage of Democratic Senate Majority Leader from Texas, Senator Lyndon Johnson, and Democratic House Speaker, Sam Rayburn, also of Texas.
For decades since Hawaii had been declared a Territory in 1900, Hawaii's Delegates to Congress (Republicans until Burns in 1956) had tried to get Congress to grant Hawaii Statehood as the 49th State to be followed by Alaska -- with 1/5 the population of Hawaii -- as the 50th. And, each session, the Hawaii 49th State bill died. In 1956, when Burns arrived on Capitol Hill, Lyndon Johnson was already making plans to run for U.S. President in 1960. John didn't want to be viewed on the national scene as being racist, and so he latched on to the idea that, if he supported Statehood for Hawaii, which would be the very first Territory with a non-white population to become a State, he could reduce that stereotype.
And Johnson, Rayburn, and Burns came up with a new strategy: Let Alaska become a new State first as the 49th State -- and then Hawaii would then have an easier time (pardon the obvious analogy;) surfing in as the 50th State in the wake of the Alaska momentum. This strategy would help overcome two of the three main reasons often cited as to why Alaska and Hawaii should not be States: (1) They are non-contiguous to the other 48 States. Granted, Alaska is non-contiguous by only the 200 miles of British Columbia that separate it from Washington State, but the fact remains Alaska IS, indeed, non-contiguous. (2) The International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union (ILWU) was viewed as being Communist-leaning during the Joseph McCarthy "Red Scare" days of the late 1940s -- but Alaska had a higher proportion of its population that was ILWU members than did Hawaii. And (3) Hawaii would be the first Territory with a non-white population to be admitted into the Union (Alaska had a white majority population far larger than the Native Tribes population of Eskimos, Aleuts, and Intuits). This last argument (3) Delegate Burns turned on its head: He said: "What a great example Hawaii is that the U.S. can show to the rest of the world that non-whites and whites can live in relative harmony and that democracy can work in such a mixed society."
So, Burns let the Alaska Statehood Bill go first, for a change, and, in the summer of 1958, the Alaska Statehood Bill passed both houses of Congress -- and Alaska became the 49th State. And then the Congress adjourned! Delegate Burns had to come home to Hawaii and spent most of the time in his 1958 re-election campaign trying to convince a majority of the voters that "Now that Alaska has gotten Statehood, we in Hawaii will be next, in the next session of Congress." Luckily for Burns, he turned out to be correct, but there sure was a lot of nail-biting before his 1958 re-election. He returned to Congress in January 1959 and, with the support of his mentors, Senate Majority Leader Johnson and Speaker Rayburn, shepherded the "Hawaii 50th State" Bill through in March, 1959, followed by a formal signing ceremony at the White House in August. HENCE: STATEHOOD DAY IS A STATE HOLIDAY ON THE THIRD FRIDAY OF EACH AUGUST.
BUT THE STORY'S NOT DONE -- AND SOME WOULD SAY, FAR FROM DONE -- You will note, in Paragraph 11, above, that the Hawaii Statehood movement gained momentum here only after the AJA (Americans of Japanese ancestry) veterans who survived fighting in Europe in World War II came home after the War -- and advocated Statehood as being the best tribute that they could provide to their friends who had lost their lives fighting in Europe for the U.S. and proving their loyalty to the U.S.
Over the past 61 years of Statehood, however -- as I've noted in Paragraph 3 above -- community attitudes toward Statehood have changed: In 1958, after the Hawaii Statehood Bill passed Congress, as required by the Bill, a "plebiscite" -- a direct vote of the electorate -- was held to approve Statehood: The vote was 85 percent for, 15 percent against. Interestingly, the only precinct that voted against Statehood was the 200 voters, mostly of Native Hawaiian ancestry, on the Island of Niihau. Attitudes toward the benefits of Statehood began to shift in the 1970s with the so-called Hawaiian Renaissance, when a younger generation of part-Native-Hawaiians (there are only 9,000 pure bloods, but 300,000 others in Hawaii's total population today of 1.2 residents -- 1/4 -- claim at least some Native Hawaiian ancestry, including my wife and our two now-grown children). In the 1970s, the Ku'e Petitions objecting to Hawaii annexation to the U.S. in 1898 -- which Petitions had been forgotten by most of the populace for a generation -- came back into the community consciousness.
In addition, since the 1970s, there has been a realization that there has not been a full accounting -- and not been full payment -- by the federal (U.S.) government for its use of lands originally belonging to the Nation of Hawaii for primarily military bases. When Hawaii was annexed in 1898, the Republic of Hawaii "ceded" (gave over) to the U.S. government all of the lands that had belonged to the Kingdom of Hawaii government under Lili'uokalani. So, bases such as Pearl Harbor and all the other military bases in Hawaii were used by the federal government without any compensation (contra to the last clause of the Fifth Amendment: "nor shall private property be taken for public use without compensation") to the Territorial government. Then, under the Statehood Act of 1959, the federal government "ceded" back to the new State of Hawaii government the lands that the federal government had gotten from the Republic of Hawaii.
In the Statehood Act of 1959, it is stated (no pun intended) that the "ceded lands" being returned to the State of Hawaii government by the federal government shall be used for five purposes (e.g., public education schools) -- the fifth purpose of which is "for the betterment of the lives of Native Hawaiians. Thus, the State courts have ruled that 20 percent of the income from "ceded lands" now held by the State (i.e., 1 of the 5 purposes equals 20 percent) must go to "the betterment of the lives of Native Hawaiians." However, after 61 years of Statehood, the State government and the various community groups representing the interests of Native Hawaiians are still negotiating a "universal settlement." So, you can see why celebrations for Statehood on this holiday are muted not only due to the coronavirus but also because of the unresolved issues of "just compensation."
It's also interesting to note that, when the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress in 1993 - the 100th anniversary of the overthrow of Queen Lili'uoklani -- by a majority in both houses, the Congress passed what's called "the Apology Resolution" -- In a Joint Resolution of Congress passed in 1993, it is admitted that overthrow of the Queen was illegal, and that the U.S. government apologizes for that. But, at the same time, the Resolution, of course, does not say that, the coup having been illegal, Hawaii can have its independence back.
Meanwhile, there is a small but vocal group of Native Hawaiians and their supporters who assert that the Nation of Hawaii was NOT extinguished with the overthrow of Queen Lili'uokalani because, to begin with, in their view, the overthrow was illegal under international law. Further, they assert that the annexation process by the U.S. Congress in 1898 is fatally flawed because the Congress changed the rules for approval of annexation. This small but vocal group asserts that the Nation of Hawaii, from the days of the Queen, has never been extinguished and that Hawaii is an unwilling "colony" of the U.S.A. This group has even filed a petition with the United Nations Committee on Decolonization, asking for a hearing
Is Hawaii and are the people of Hawaii "better off" for being a State of the U.S.A. rather than an independent Nation? For example, the average citizen has more individual rights under the U.S. Bill of Rights to the U.S. Constitution than that average citizen would have had under the Constitution of the independent Nation of Hawaii back in 1893.
Perhaps what I call a "purposeful ambiguity" may be best? Most of us in Hawaii are comfortable of being BOTH U.S. citizens AND supportive of Native Hawaiian rights. I have a U.S. Army Reserve officer friend who is both an Army officer and a Native Hawaiian, and he does not see the two as being in conflict. Interestingly, at the same time, in the community at large, the State government has not scheduled, for the past 25 years now, any special commemoration ceremony or concert to mark Statehood Day. Now, that's, in my humble opinion, "purposeful ambiguity"!!!